Converting image format

ABSTRACT

An apparatus for converting an image format of data and a method thereof is disclosed. An apparatus for converting an image format of data comprises an image converter ( 126 ) for converting parameters of the image format, an encoder ( 127 ) for encoding the format changed data and a file system converter ( 128 ) for changing the encodes data into a file system supported by an external interface ( 121 ). Also, a method for converting an image format of data comprises converting the image format of data into another image format, encoding the format changed data into a compressed data, and converting data into a file system which an external interface supports.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION(S)

This application is a Continuation Application of prior U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 12/299,060 filed Oct. 30, 2008, which is a NationalStage application under 35 U.S.C. §365 of International Application No.PCT/KR2007/002142 filed on May 2, 2007, which claims priority under 35U.S.C. §119 to Korean Application No. 10-2006-0039573 filed on May 2,2006, whose entire disclosures are hereby incorporated by reference.

BACKGROUND

1. Field

The present disclosure relates to converting image format.

2. Background

Heretofore, a digital broadcasting receiver such as a digital televisionand a set-top box (STB) having a digital broadcasting reception functionreceives digital TV broadcasting data of an Advanced Television SystemsCommittee (ATSC) MPEG-2 Transport Streams (TSs). The digitalbroadcasting receiver performs a MPEG decoding and a signal processingfor the received digital TV broadcasting data, and outputs video data ofhigh picture quality and audio data of high speech quality.

Further, a digital broadcasting receiver with a Personal Video Recording(hereinafter, referred to as PVR) function has also been developed andcommercialized. The PVR can store received digital TV broadcasting dataof ATSC MPEG-2 TSs in a high capacity hard disk, and reproduce thestored digital TV broadcasting data at a time desired by a user.

However, a mobile terminal such as a mobile phone, a Personal DigitalAssistant (PDA) and a Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB) device has alower resolution and smaller size than those of conventional digitalbroadcasting format.

The above references are incorporated by reference herein whereappropriate for appropriate teachings of additional or alternativedetails, features and/or technical background.

DISCLOSURE OF INVENTION

Accordingly, the present disclosure is directed to converting imageformat that substantially obviates one or more problems due tolimitations and disadvantages of the related art.

An object of the present disclosure is to provide a method/device thatcan directly or automatically convert high resolution and large sizedigital TV broadcasting programs into low resolution and small sizeprograms.

Another object of the present disclosure is to provide a digitaltelevision and method that can solve at least the above problems and/ordisadvantages and to provide at least the advantages describedhereinafter.

A further object of the present disclosure is to provide a digitaltelevision and method that can convert first received data format into adifferent second converted data format so that the received data can betransmitted in the second format for playback in an external apparatus.

Additional advantages, objects, and features of the disclosure will beset forth in part in the description which follows and in part willbecome apparent to those having ordinary skill in the art uponexamination of the following or may be learned from practice of thedisclosure. The objectives and other advantages of the disclosure may berealized and attained by the structure particularly pointed out in thewritten description and claims hereof as well as the appended drawings.

To achieve these objects and other advantages and in accordance with thepurpose of the disclosure, as embodied and broadly described herein,there is provided a method for converting an image format of datacomprising converting the image format of data into another imageformat, encoding the format changed data into a compressed data, andconverting the encoded data into a file system which an externalinterface supports.

To further achieve the above objects in a whole or in part, according toanother aspect of the disclosure, there is provided an apparatus forconverting an image format of data comprising an image converter forconverting parameters of the image format, an encoder for encoding theformat changed data and a file system converter for changing the encodeddata into a file system supported by an external interface.

It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description andthe following detailed description of the present disclosure areexemplary and explanatory and are intended to provide furtherexplanation of the disclosure as claimed.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The accompanying drawings, which are included to provide a furtherunderstanding of the disclosure and are incorporated in and constitute apart of this application, illustrate embodiment(s) of the disclosure andtogether with the description serve to explain the principle of thedisclosure.

FIG. 1 illustrates a block diagram of a receiver according to oneembodiment of the present disclosure;

FIG. 2 illustrates a block diagram of a receiver according to anotherembodiment of the present disclosure;

FIG. 3 illustrates a flowchart of converting image format;

FIG. 4 illustrates a television screen displaying a control panel;

FIG. 5 illustrates the control panel illustrated on FIG. 4; and

FIG. 6 illustrates the control panel illustrated on FIG. 4 with adifferent setting.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

Reference will now be made in detail to the preferred embodiments of thepresent disclosure, examples of which are illustrated in theaccompanying drawings. Wherever possible, the same reference numberswill be used throughout the drawings to refer to the same or like parts.

Embodiments according to the disclosure can be applied to various typesof receivers such as STBs and digital TVs with PVR functions, whichreceive digital TV broadcasting data and store the received digital TVbroadcasting data in a storage device such as a hard disk.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a receiver according to one embodiment ofthe present disclosure. As shown in FIG. 1, the receiver can include adigital antenna 11, a digital tuner 12, an demultiplexer 13, storagesuch as a personal video recorder (PVR) 14, a video processor 15, a dataprocessor 16, an audio processor 17, a display 18, and a speaker.

As shown in FIG. 1, the receiver can further include a digital antenna22, an analog tuner 23, and an A/D converter 24. A mobile terminal (notshown) can be coupled to the receiver through an external interface 21.

First of all, the digital antenna 11 receives broadcast signals as aform of ATSC MPEG-2 streams by tuning the digital tuner 12 according toa user request to select a digital TV broadcasting channel. The digitaltuner converts the received MPEG-2 streams into MPEG-2 Transport Streams(TSs). The demultiplxer 13 decodes the MPEG-2 TSs into high resolution(e.g., 1920*1080i pixels) data for large screen television. The videoprocessor 15 can signal process the decoded video data to output videosignals of high picture quality, and the audio processor 17 can performsignal processing and amplification for the decoded audio data to outputaudio signals of high speech quality. The ATSC MPEG-2 TSs of the tuneddigital TV broadcasting program can also be stored in the storage 14such as PVRs.

Moreover, the receiver can receive analog broadcasting programs byanalog antenna 122 and analog tuner 123 and converts the analog signalsinto digital signals through the ND converter 124. The ND convertedsignals are processed using the same video 15, data 16 and audioprocessors 17.

FIG. 2 includes a format converter 125 in addition to the elementsillustrated on FIG. 1. The video format converter 126 can perform animage downsizing operation of converting the video data decoded by thedemultiplxer 113, e.g., a picture sequence with a resolution of1920.times.1080 pixels, to a picture sequence with a reduced resolution(e.g., 352.times.288 pixels), which can be employed by the DMB receiver,or the H.264 compressed format. In addition, the video format converter126 can perform an aspect ratio control operation for adjusting theaspect ratio of the video data to be proper for the aspect ratio of anLCD screen with a reduced size (e.g., 2.2, 3.5 or 7 inch), which themobile terminal can employ. For example, an aspect ratio for conversionmay be preset or modified through an environment setup menu, which isprovided by the controller 14 through an already embedded Graphic UserInterface (GUI), as conversion conditions.

The audio also can be converted from the audio data decoded by thedemultiplexer 113, e.g., 5.1 CH Pulse Code Modulation (PCM) audio data,to data of a format that, e.g., the DMB device can support, i.e., 2 CHPCM audio data.

The encoder 127 can encode the video data converted by the video formatconverter 126 into, e.g., a DMB format video data according to aH.264/AVC standard. The encoder 127 also can encode the audio dataconverted by the video format converter 126 into, e.g., a DMB formataudio data according to an ISO/IEC 14496-3 BSAC standard.

The file system converter 128 converts the encoded data by the encoder127 into a file system that the external interface 121 supports. Theexternal interface includes Universal Serial Bus (USB), IEEE 1394, andEPF.

The MPEG-2 TSs can be stored in the storage 114. For example, thestorage 114 separately stores the format converted MPEG-2 TSs and theATSC MPEG-2 TSs of the digital TV broadcasting format outputted from thedemultiplxer 113 as different data files.

FIG. 3 illustrates a flowchart of converting image format according toone embodiment of the disclosure. The embodiment of the method of FIG. 3can be applied to and will be described using the receiver shown in FIG.2. However, the disclosure is not intended to be so limited.

The digital tuner 112 tunes one random digital TV broadcasting channelaccording to a user's request. The ATSC decoder (not shown) candemodulate the audio/video signals from the antenna 111 and stores atthe storage 114 the demodulated audio/video signals (S210). The videoformat converter 126 converts the format of the stored audio/videosignals into another format of audio/video signals (S220). The encoder(127) encodes the audio/video data into a compressed data (S230). Thefile system converter 128 converts the encoded data into a file systemwhich the external interface 121 supports (S240). The external interface121 outputs the encoded data to an external device (not shown).

FIG. 4 illustrates a television screen displaying a control panel. Thetelevision main screen 400 includes preview window 410 and control panel420. The preview window 410 provides thumbnail images of theformat-converted image signals before the format conversion settings areapplied to a specific mobile terminal. The control panel 420 is enlargedin FIG. 5 and FIG. 6.

FIG. 5 illustrates the control panel illustrated on FIG. 4. The controlpanel 420 comprises a current image format part 420 a and a changeableformat part 420 b. The current image format part 420 a further comprisesa current image format 421, current voice (audio) format 422, andcurrent compression format 423. The changeable format part furthercomprises change format to manual or automatic 424, width and heightsizes 425, change voice format to mono or surround 426, changecompression format to MPEG-2 TS or H.264 427, and user interface as USB,IEEE 1394 or EPF 428.

FIG. 6 illustrates the control panel illustrated on FIG. 4 with adifferent setting. It is possible to select manual or automatic formatchange. User can input desired format change parameters manually. Also,when the user put the format change to automatic and input the modelname and number, the receiver automatically find corresponding prestoredparameters.

Any reference in this specification to “one embodiment,” “anembodiment,” “example embodiment,” etc., means that a particularfeature, structure, or characteristic described in connection with theembodiment is included in at least one embodiment of the disclosure. Theappearances of such phrases in various places in the specification arenot necessarily all referring to the same embodiment. Further, when aparticular feature, structure, or characteristic is described inconnection with any embodiment, it is submitted that it is within thepurview of one skilled in the art to effect such feature, structure, orcharacteristic in connection with other ones of the embodiments.Furthermore, for ease of understanding, certain method procedures mayhave been delineated as separate procedures; however, these separatelydelineated procedures should not be construed as necessarily orderdependent in their performance. That is, some procedures may be able tobe performed in an alternative ordering, simultaneously, etc.

The foregoing embodiments and advantages are merely exemplary and arenot to be construed as limiting the present disclosure. The presentteaching can be readily applied to other types of apparatuses. Thedescription of the present disclosure is intended to be illustrative,and not to limit the scope of the claims. Many alternatives,modifications, and variations will be apparent to those skilled in theart. In the claims, means- plus-function clauses are intended to coverthe structures described herein as performing the recited function andnot only structural equivalents but also equivalent structures.

It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that variousmodifications and variations can be made in the present disclosurewithout departing from the spirit or scope of the disclosures. Thus, itis intended that the present disclosure covers the modifications andvariations of this disclosure provided they come within the scope of theappended claims and their equivalents.

By converting a high resolution, large size image format of abroadcasting program to a low resolution, small size image format, aportable device including PDA, mobile phone and DMB can save and displaythe high definition television quality broadcasting programs.

Although embodiments have been described with reference to a number ofillustrative embodiments thereof, it should be understood that numerousother modifications and embodiments can be devised by those skilled inthe art that will fall within the spirit and scope of the principles ofthis disclosure. More particularly, various variations and modificationsare possible in the component parts and/or arrangements of the subjectcombination arrangement within the scope of the disclosure, the drawingsand the appended claims. In addition to variations and modifications inthe component parts and/or arrangements, alternative uses will also beapparent to those skilled in the art.

1. A method for converting image data in a display apparatus, the methodcomprising: storing image data in a memory; converting the stored imagedata from a first screen value into a second screen value, wherein thefirst screen value is different from the second screen value, furtherthe second screen value is further changeable; displaying, on a screen,at least three areas, the at least three areas including a first area, asecond area and a third area, wherein: the first area includes imagedata displayed according to the first screen value before the convertingto the second screen value, the second area includes a preview area thatdisplays the image data that has been converted to the second screenvalue, and the third area includes control information for changing thefirst screen value to the second screen value; and sending, from thedisplay apparatus, the image data that has been converted to the secondscreen value to an external device.
 2. The method of claim 1, furthercomprising: receiving audio/video signal from an antenna; demultiplexingthe audio/video signal into audio data and video data; and extractingimage data from the demuliplexed video data.
 3. The method of claim 2,wherein the converting comprises: converting the stored image data froma first data format to a second data format; encoding the convertedimage data into a compressed data; and converting the encoded data intoa file system which an external interface supports.
 4. The method ofclaim 1, further comprising: receiving a user's command to provide thesecond screen value.
 5. The method of claim 1, wherein the third areafurther includes a first sub area and a second sub area.
 6. The methodof claim 5, wherein at least one value within the first sub area ischangeable, and at least one value within the second sub area isunchangeable based on a type of the screen value.
 7. The method of claim1, wherein the first area, the second area and the third area areindependent of each other.
 8. The method of claim 1, wherein each of thescreen values correspond to at least one a format type, a width, aheight, a size, an aspect ratio, a compression format parameter and auser interface parameter.
 9. The method of claim 1, wherein the displayapparatus corresponds to a television, a monitor or a mobile device. 10.The method of claim 1, wherein the external device corresponds to amobile phone, a personal digital assistance or a digital multimediabroadcasting (DMB) device.
 11. A display apparatus for converting imagedata, the display apparatus comprising: a memory configured to storeimage data; a converter configured to convert the stored image data froma first screen value into a second screen value, wherein the firstscreen value is different from the second screen value, and the secondscreen value is further changeable; a display module; a controllerconfigured to the display module for displaying at least three areas thedisplayed at least three areas including a first area, a second area anda third area, wherein: the first area includes image data displayedaccording to the first screen value before converting the image datafrom the first screen value to the second screen value, the second areaincludes a preview area to display the image data that has beenconverted to the second screen value, and the third area includescontrol information for changing the first screen value to the secondscreen value; and a sending device configured to send, to an externaldevice, the image data that has been converted to the second screenvalue.
 12. The display apparatus of claim 11, further comprising: anuser interface configured to receive a user's command to provide thesecond screen value.
 13. The display apparatus of claim 11, wherein thethird area further includes a first sub area and a second sub area. 14.The display apparatus of claim 13, wherein at least one value within thefirst sub area is changeable, and at least one value within the secondsub area is unchangeable based on a type of the screen's value.
 15. Thedisplay apparatus of claim 11, wherein the first area, the second areaand the third area are independent of each other.
 16. The displayapparatus of claim 11, further comprising: an encoder configured toencode the image data converted to the second screen value into a formatcorresponding to an external interface of the display apparatus, andchange the encoded image data into a data transfer format correspondingto the external interface.
 17. The display apparatus of claim 11,wherein each of the screen values correspond to at least one a formattype, a width, a height, a size, a color an aspect ratio, a compressionformat parameter and a user interface parameter.
 18. The displayapparatus of claim 11, wherein the display apparatus corresponds to atelevision, a monitor or a mobile device.
 19. The display apparatus ofclaim 11, wherein the external device corresponds to a mobile phone, apersonal digital assistance or a digital multimedia broadcasting (DMB)device.
 20. The display apparatus of claim 16, wherein the externalinterface corresponds to USB or IEEE
 1394. 21. The display apparatus ofclaim 11, wherein the sending device includes an external interface. 22.The display apparatus of claim 11, wherein the sending device includes aUniversal Serial Bus (USB).
 23. The display apparatus of claim 11,wherein the image data is television data.
 24. A method of a displayapparatus, the method comprising: storing image data; displaying, on ascreen, the image data in a first area of the screen; converting acharacteristic of the image data from a first value to a second value,wherein the first value is different from the second value, and thesecond value is further changeable; displaying, on the screen, the imagedata having the converted characteristic in a second area of the screen;displaying information, in a third area of the screen, for changing thecharacteristic of the image data; and sending, from the displayapparatus, the image data converted to the second value to a device thatis external to the display apparatus.
 25. The method of claim 24,wherein the image data is television data.
 26. The method of claim 24,wherein the second area is a preview window.
 27. The method of claim 24,wherein the characteristic is a format type, a width, a height, a size,an aspect ratio, a compression format parameter or a user interfaceparameter.
 28. The method of claim 24, wherein the display apparatus isa television.
 29. The method of claim 24, wherein the device that isexternal to the display apparatus is a mobile phone.